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Coaxing a Pentium II to use a CF adaptor

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VMSZealot

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I have a Pentium II based PC for nostalgias sake, and I'd like to be able to get files onto it quickly from a more modern machine. After all, if I can pull off this trick with an XT (using a CF to 8bit ISA adaptor), or with a Mac G3 (using a StarTech IDE to CF adaptor) then it should be a doddle, right? Wrong. The activity light doesn't even blink on the StarTech adaptor when used in the Pentium II (M747 motherboard). The computer works in every other way - spinning rust hard drive is fine, floppy disk is fine, it all checks out. It just doesn't like CF. I've even tried setting the CF adaptor to master and having it as the only IDE device connected. I also tried using the CF to 8bit ISA adaptor - but it doesn't see that at all (although it happily works with other ISA boards that I've tried) Nothing works.

So I'm ready to try something new. Can anyone recommend a solution which will work with MS-DOS 6? Doesn't have to be CF - an SD card will be just as satisfactory. I just want to be able to copy files onto my PC without a) burning coasters all the time (which is a faff) or b) farting around with floppy disks which is unreliable and a faff!
 
While your motherboard is well into the era of IDE LBA support, it does have a low budget SiS chipset from an even lower budget manufacturer, PC-Chips. There be dragons.

CF adapters are no more than passive interface changers, so that can be ruled out. You didn't specify what size of CF card you tried, but maybe try a smaller one, or a different brand. Something 2 GB or less.

If the BIOS supports a USER TYPE 47 option, you can try fudging the CHS values to get a size under but close to the max size of your CF card and see if that works. Just be sure to note the values you used for future reference.
 
I've tried using 1GB Lexar and 2GB Sandisk Extreme III cards.

I also have 256MB and 512MB Kingston cards and a 256MB Lexar card that I can try. I have no idea what size to manually enter for them though - particularly not for wpcom (I can have a reasonable stab at the other settings).

It still doesn't answer why the activity light on the adaptor didn't flash though does it? Surely it should have been flashing when the computer tried to use the cards - even if the computer wasn't actually able to make sense of them.

It's a head scratcher!
 
VMSZealot said:
Can anyone recommend a solution which will work with MS-DOS 6? Doesn't have to be CF - an SD card will be just as satisfactory. I just want to be able to copy files onto my PC without a) burning coasters all the time (which is a faff) or b) farting around with floppy disks which is unreliable and a faff!
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If you have networking, FTP is among the easiest solutions once setup.
Hear me out before ditching the idea: you run a simple batch file to load the packet driver, mTCP DHCP + FTP server on the PII. Then you use a modern FTP client on your PC to transfer files.
 
I think those are wise words, Konc - but I don't have a network card (much less an MS-DOS 6.2 compatible card) for that PC. I did consider pushing files over using serial, but a CF card would be quicker. Especially since I think I've got all the bits and bobs that I need - I just don't know the magic words to make it all work!
 
Get yourself a Western Digital "SiliconDrive" PATA CF card. Everyone should have at least one of these in their inventory for troubleshooting. Designed specifically for replacing a spinning disk in industrial applications. I usually use these for the initial install, then I image the drive over to another CF card and it works every time even when the other card could not be made to post. The cards range in size from a few hundred megs up to 8 gigs and can be had for $5-10 USD, shipped.

konc said:
If you have networking, FTP is among the easiest solutions once setup.
Click to expand...
Do you have a good rock-simple FTP server you can recommend for something like this? I once spend a whole afternoon trying and couldn't make a single one work. I don't know if its user error or something on my network, but I found it very frustrating.
 
dumb/obvious question but I made this mistake myself. Do you have power plugged into the CF adapter?

Other machines worked fine without power but my Pentium and Pentium II machines all required power for the CF card to work as expected.
 
I tried it with the power connected, but only once (and with only one card). But all the lights on the adaptor (other than activity) lit without the power connector being connected. I'll try again though.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
Do you have a good rock-simple FTP server you can recommend for something like this? I once spend a whole afternoon trying and couldn't make a single one work. I don't know if its user error or something on my network, but I found it very frustrating.
Click to expand...

@VMSZealot wanted an MS-DOS 6 solution, so my recommendation was for the mTCP suite. It's really all you need for both the DHCP functionality and the FTP server, and super simple. Let me know if I can help with anything.
 
konc said:
@VMSZealot wanted an MS-DOS 6 solution, so my recommendation was for the mTCP suite. It's really all you need for both the DHCP functionality and the FTP server, and super simple. Let me know if I can help with anything.
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Can you recommend a particular Ethernet card that would work with DOS 6?
 
What about something like 3COM Etherlink III 3C509B BNC Ethernet NIC ISA Network card? I have an AUI adaptor to give me RJ45.
 
I haven't tried them, but crynwr.com listed in my link above has drivers for the 3C509
 
konc said:
@VMSZealot wanted an MS-DOS 6 solution, so my recommendation was for the mTCP suite. It's really all you need for both the DHCP functionality and the FTP server, and super simple. Let me know if I can help with anything.
Click to expand...
This appears to be something for DOS. I'm looking for a simple FTP server I can run on one of my modern PCs to ease file transfers to the retro ones.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
This appears to be something for DOS. I'm looking for a simple FTP server I can run on one of my modern PCs to ease file transfers to the retro ones.
Click to expand...

You can of course run the server on the modern PC, I've used FileZilla without problems.
But my suggestion was to do the opposite, run the server on the retro PC. This way you can do all the work from just 1 contemporary FTP client on your modern PC. If it's not clear why this approach is more convenient, it becomes apparent when you start using it
 
I have yet to see a Pentium II system that does not work with a CF card. For those, even the drive type the CF card reports (fixed or removable) makes no difference.

Connect the IDE cable (the right way!), the power cable, make sure the adapter is "master" and there is no other device on the same cable (won't work with CF cards), and then there's no reason why it would not just work.

As for the LED, you can ignore that. On most adapters, the activity LED is actually broken by design. :ROFLMAO:
 
Timo W. said:
make sure the adapter is "master" and there is no other device on the same cable (won't work with CF cards),
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I'm just curious - if CF cards are supposed to be pin-compatible to IDE, how come you can't have 2 devices on the same IDE cable?

I accept this limitation, I'd just like to understand why it is.
 
hunterjwizzard said:
I'm just curious - if CF cards are supposed to be pin-compatible to IDE, how come you can't have 2 devices on the same IDE cable?

I accept this limitation, I'd just like to understand why it is.
Click to expand...
CF cards exist in 3 different modes. Only what is referred to as True IDE mode supports having 2 drives on the same channel. The PC Card Memory Mode and PC Card I/O mode ground the Drive Select pin so those cards have no way of knowing which card is being accessed. Cheaper cards that are not intended for use in a computer do not implement True IDE mode.

That is described on page 27 of the CF 2.0 specification.
 
Power the CF adapter via cable, try using a brand name card. Out of 7-8 that I have, it's just the "Clouddisk" one that doesn't work, SanDisks and Transcends work fine. Your BIOS should autodetect these.
Try to rule out that the board/BIOS isn't being naughty by plugging in the adapter to another machine. Did you rule out that the IDE controller is actually working, like connecting the CF adapter to where your detected HDD was?
 
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